The Park on Sunday
by Ariaprincess
Summary: Matthew usually hides in the basement when his parents fight. However, today he wants to do something different. And 'different' definitely describes the albino boy he meets in the park that night. PruCan friendship, one-shot, may have sequel, rated T for mild language and because I'm paranoid.


It wasn't often that Matthew went on his "trips", only when his parents fought. Which, actually, was pretty often.

Today it started with taxes. Francis bitching, sorry, complaining about Arthur not having done them, Arthur retaliating with how he had to do everything else around the house, so on and so forth until Matthew felt like his head was about to explode into a thousand itty-bitty pieces. Alfred had his own way of dealing with this; hole himself up in their room and play video games at full volume until the storm passed and it was safe to venture downstairs again. Matthew didn't have this luxury, not having a bedroom of his own to shut himself in, and was forced to find some other manner of shutting out the awful, raging tirade of words. Usually, the basement helped obfuscate some of the endless anger, but he could still hear the fight through the ceiling. He had tried earbuds, but to no avail.

Today, he was going to try something different.

Trying to deflect questions as much as possible from his nosy brother, Matthew reached into the closet and pulled out his favorite red hoodie, the one with the white maple leaf stitched into it; his MP3 player, and earbuds.

"You goin' somewhere, bro?" Alfred asked loudly, transfixed to the screen and splatters of gore and red.

"Something like that." Matthew sighed and left Alfred to his own devices. He breezed past his yelling parents with a simple "going for a walk". They didn't respond, too caught up in the fight to be bothered by such trivial matters.

The sound of the rubber soles of his sneakers hitting the pavement was comforting, the hostile atmosphere left far behind as he perused the silent streets. Red, golden, and browning leaves swept past him, buffeted by a subtle, sweetly perfumed wind. The air was scented with baking goods from the Finnish bakery on the corner, sugary and thick, serving as a distraction from the angry thoughts running around Matthews mind. He pulled out his phone, plugged in his earbuds, and turned on one of his favorite rock songs, one that was a fail-safe for days like this.

He walked and walked for what seemed like forever, finally coming to a stop at an old play structure. It was rather plain, a simple climbing structure bordered by a chain-link fence, a slide and a swing set to boot. Matthew wandered over and say on one of the swings, mindlessly pushing himself back and forth slightly with his foot.

"Heh, I thought I was the only one who came here on Sundays."

Matthew was startled out of his song-fueled oblivion by a voice whispering in his ear, an unfamiliar raspy baritone.

"Relax, I'm not going to, like, bite your head off or something!" The boy who had spoken moved over to the other swing and sat down, smirking quietly at Matthew. His eye and hair color seemed unreal, with red irises and snowy-white, shaggy tresses.

"I'm Gilbert, what's your name?" The boy asked, unnerving Matthew by staring at him intensely. The blonde boy stuttered, "I'm M-Matthew. Nice to meet you." Ever polite, Matthew held out his hand for Gilbert to shake. Gilbert took it roughly, jerking it up and down.

"It's cool to see somebody else who comes to the park at night. I don't really come in the day, 'cause this albinism and stuff makes daylight a living hell." Gilbert spoke rapidly, as if he was hyped up on three cans of Red Bull, and roughly, as if he had chased it down with a pad of sandpaper. It was a strange voice, for sure, but Matthew was inclined to listen to it.

"Do you regularly come to the park at night?" Matthew asked, unplugging his earbuds. Gilbert nodded.

"Yeah, this park is an awesome place if you want to be alone, ya know what I mean?"

Matthew thought back to his screeching parents.

"Yeah, unfortunately. Why would you want to be alone?"

"Mostly because my parents are being huge dicks right now. My brother is the studious type, see? And if the awesome me is anything, it's not studious. And so they're all like 'be a doctor, be an engineer, be a scientist' and I don't want to be any of those unawesome things. So to get away from all the whining, I come here." Gilbert finished his rant with a huff, leaning back on the swing. "You?"

"Oh, um, my parents fight a lot. I usually go down in the basement, because my brother locks himself in our room and plays these awful video games at full volume, but today I wanted to, um, do something different." Matthew finished his sentence with the words in a jumble, out of breath and nervous about having revealed so much. Gilbert chuckled.

"Wow, that's harsh. I wish my brother played games, all he does is study and talk about his cute little Italian boy-toy."

"Boy-toy?" Matthew was confused.

"Yeah, Feliciano Vargas, awesome guy, but kinda annoying after a while. Ludwig is totally crushing on him, it's so obvious it's sad."

Matthew was beginning to notice a trend in Gilbert's speech pattern. "Sounds complicated. My brother doesn't really like anybody, and I'm glad. He's the same age as me, actually. We were supposed to be twins, but he was delivered a few days after I was."

"That's complicated. Do you two look alike?"

"Yeah, people sometimes mistake me for him, it's kind of annoying, actually." Matthew sighed, swinging back and forth with tiny, rocking movements.

"Sounds bad, I'm glad Luddy doesn't look like me, or his head would probably explode into glitter or something from how awesome he looked." This sent both boys into a fit of laughter, eventually petering out into soft giggles.

"Anyway, how old are you? You look like you're my age..." Matthew asked, after wiping away a small tear.

"Seventeen. You?"

"Sixteen. Wow, that's surprising. Do you go to International High?"

"Yeah, I can't believe I've never seen you before. Or vice versa, you know, I'm not the easiest guy to miss." Gilbert's red eyes were intoxicated, always darting around with what seemed like an endless plethora of energy and sparkle. It was fascinating to watch, really, especially since he had only known him for all of a couple of minutes.

"Ah, shit, it's getting late. I need to head back, or my parents will kill me!"

"I know how you feel, parents can be really annoying." Gilbert groaned and stood, fiddling for something in his pocket. While Matthew waited patiently, he eventually produced his phone.

"Can I have your number?"

Matthew flushed red, before nodding and typing in his number.

"Uh, see you later?" Gilbert said hopefully, stuffing his phone, and his hands, in his pockets and smirking. Matthew nodded.

"Definitely. Tomorrow at lunch?"

The smallest of smiles shared, a blush, a wink.

"Sure."


End file.
